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Founded in the rather wet summer of 2007, ScentedShrubs.com was established as a nursery specialising in, as the name suggests, scented shrubs, climbers and roses.

Marc Fulljames, a Director and co-owner of the nursery, has had 24 years experience as a landscape gardener and garden designer and has often used scented shrubs in his gardens to much acclaim. He has noted, even in public gardens, how under-utilised scented plants are. Certainly scent was found in some gardens, but this was often provided by individual specimens that only flowered briefly - there was no continuation throughout the seasons. There is little as arresting, walking through a garden, as the curry scent drifting from helichrysums, the lemony bouquet of Magnolia sieboldii or the penetratingly sweet aroma of the winter blooming Lonicera fragrantissima.

During visits to garden centres, observing customers stopping to enjoy the scent of a David Austin rose or azalea luteum while simply glancing at the non-scented plants, Marc realised that he was far from alone in finding the attraction of scent as important as a plant's appearance.

Having always wanted his own nursery, Marc approached a client who owned a 10-acre smallholding in the charming West Sussex village of Rusper and broached the idea of establishing one.

Several months later, ScentedShrubs.com was carved out of the corner of a small, ancient hay meadow. Although only a small site at present, the nursery already holds more than 40 plant varieties to provide a continuation of scent throughout the seasons and is continuously sourcing new and unusual plants.  

Run as an eco-friendly business and as organic as possible, ScentedShrubs.com tries to source all of its stock, packaging and materials from local and sustainable sources.

So most of the stock was bought locally as 9cm liners and potted into 3 litre recyclable polypropylene pots with environmentally friendly compost. Water from the mains is served to each pot by individual drip pipes – this cuts down on wasted water and is also cost efficient.

To provide natural shade for the hottest days, one hundred and twenty five native tree whips were bought in, potted up and placed in a line down the centre of each bed. These provide gentle, slow moving areas of dappled shade naturally, without the need to buy oil based plastic shade webbing. Some of these trees will then be sold locally at the end of the year and the rest planted in small copses around the boundary of the hay meadow to attract wildlife.

The surrounding fields are home to buzzards, sparrow hawks, kestrels, tawny and barn owls, adders and grass snakes, marsh and common frogs, toads, common newts, green and common spotted woodpeckers, hummingbird hawk moths, pipistrelle and long eared bats and other interesting species.

All weeding of the pots, gravel base and drainage ditches is done by hand and no weed killers are used on site. Plants are fed with either organic seaweed or farmyard manure pellets.  

We are committed to minimising water usage. As with all our plants, these Choisya "Sundance" in 3 litre pots are fed by individual drip pipes.

As the site is situated alongside an old, mixed boundary hedge, there have been no problems with insect pests or diseases. This is partly due to the abundance of bird and beneficial insect life that travels to and from the nursery and surrounding hedges. Birds are attracted by the clever siting of various boxes – both in and around the nursery, including a barn owl box for our resident pair in an old overhanging Oak. Winter feeding of the birds, stacks of logs left in the adjacent corner of the hay meadow for insects to hide amongst, wild flowers and butterfly and bee attracting herbaceous plants grown directly around the perimeter of the site and the provision of a small pool for drinking water are all added attractions for wildlife.

Most orders for plants are placed via the company’s website, www.scentedshrubs.com and payment made by credit card. Orders by telephone are also welcome (01306 713732). 

Once the plants have been ordered, they are dispatched in recyclable cardboard boxes, filled with old scrunched up news paper and sent to their new homes by a local courier – a courier who runs a fleet of diesel powered, well serviced vans to minimize environmental impact, especially when compared to the sum of journeys made by customers to traditional garden centres.

As the site is not open to the public, all advertising is web based to cut down on paper-based flyers. Catalogues can be sent out, but are only printed as requested.

Now in its second year of trading, ScentedShrubs.com continues to evolve, based on a core of sustainability.

It is an exciting period for a new business that hopes to expand with time, while hoping to re-introduce good, old-fashioned scent back into every British garden.